A sustainable approach to fostering agricultural knowledge sharing in conflict-affected areas of Eastern Ukraine

Abstract

The agriculture sector of the Donbass Region in eastern Ukraine is facing serious challenges caused by the ongoing military conflict and consequent disruption of the earlier-established value chains. An advisory service potentially could help farmers to adapt to the changed circumstances. To inform the development process, an interview survey was conducted among 80 farmers in the region of their perceived information and advisory needs. Most interviewees stated that many issues affect the performance of their farm. Of all the given farmer × issue 'interactions' (i.e. a given farmer facing a specific issue), advice had been sought in around 70 per cent of instances. For any specific issue, most farmers sought advice from several sources. Interviewees attached very high importance to accessibility, convenience, previous personal experience, personal recommendation and confidence in the quality of advice given. Friends and family was the most popular source of advice, with farmers' organisations, local government agencies and agricultural Internet portals all being consulted by more than half of the interviewees. Many other sources were used by fewer than ten farmers. Twelve interviewees said that they would seek advice from advisory services if this was available. Following the analysis of the questionnaire results, three farmer focus groups were held to help interpret them. We conclude that, even in the absence of a formal advisory service, many farmers in the region are actively acquiring and sharing knowledge and that the agricultural innovation system continues to function despite the disruption caused by the conflict. Any new intervention should recognise this fact and be designed to improve knowledge flows between actors further, rather than to replace those that currently exist.

Searching for Dairy Farm Resilience with the R4D Project: Innovation Needs to Be Sustainable

“…It is recommended that farmers and scientists jointly build new knowledge using holistic, transdisciplinary approaches [38]. It is because of the social interactions maintained between farmers, but also with a wide range of entities promoting changes, such as buyers, suppliers of production inputs, local authorities, etc., that farmers decide to implement innovations on farms [39].…”

Bibliometric network of scientific research on knowledge sharing

“…By internalizing the dominant values, norms, and behaviors, newcomers become integrated members of an organization [15]. Typically, research in the field of knowledge sharing is quite focused, often centered around a single research topic within a specific field [16], and limited to a particular country [17]. According to [18], organizational justice has an impact on organizational commitment, knowledge sharing, and company performance.…”